https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro2018-03-19T12:17:47.956ZPosts of HRO.org in EnglishGoogle Sites1https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/39037453173995949622013-02-14T08:34:01.745Z2016-07-19T01:01:14.831Z2013-02-14T08:34:33.303ZExperts who prepared report on second Khodorkovsky prosecution subjected to harassment

Members of the Presidential Human Rights Council have alleged that two of their colleagues who prepared a report on the second prosecution and trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev have been subject to harassment. [Read more]

At the invitation of the Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights, independent experts have begun a review of the second Yukos trial. Mikhail Fedotov, head of the Council, has spoken to ITAR-TASS of this latest development.

“The experts have begun work,” Fedotov said, emphasizing that the results of this independent investigation will be made public immediately after the sentence has gone into effect. Fedotov reports that included among the experts are foreign lawyers. “Their task is to analyze the court’s verdict, which has already been published,” Fedotov said. He added that “each of the experts is working independently.”

On 1 February President Dmitry Medvedev, at a meeting of the Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights, ordered an independent legal review of several high-profile cases, including the Yukos case. On 5 February the head of the Presidential Council, Mikhail Fedotov, announced that foreign specialists would be allowed to participate in the review. A Working Group on judicial reform, set up within the Council, has already begun to prepare a review of high-profile cases.

On 10 February the Presidium of the Council of Judges claimed that an independent and public review of this kind would be unconstitutional. The official website of the Council of Judges states that the idea violates Article 19 of the Constitution that guarantees the equality of all citizens before the law and in court.

On 15 February Valery Zorkin, chair of the Constitutional Court, supported the idea of an independent review by experts. Zorkin denied that public reviews of high profile cases would amount to ‘exerting pressure on the courts.’ He said: ‘The independence of judges, a fundamental value of any democratic government, does not imply that judges should function in total secrecy.’ Instead, he said, ‘the judges’ authority is directly linked with their responsibility, which entails first and foremost their accountability before society.’

‘It is wrong to limit public attempts to analyze and evaluate court rulings in specific cases, or reactions to general categories of cases, including those stated publicly,’ Zorkin said. In Zorkin's view, ‘public scrutiny is particularly important when it comes to high profile cases that touch upon the most essential and most vulnerable of human rights: the right to life, the right to liberty and the right to security of person.’

On 30 December 2010 Moscow’s Khamovnichesky Court sentenced Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev to 14 years in a general-regime penal colony. According to Khodorkovsky's press-centre, the two men, sentenced now for a second time, could be released in 2017, since their sentence includes several years spent in pre-trial detention.

As Grani.ru points out, Mikhail Khodorkovsky himself has said that his second trial was politically motivated and corrupt. He affirms that the trial was initiated by people who do not want to see him at liberty. The former head of the giant oil company says that it was his support for independent political opposition in Russia that explains his criminal prosecution.

Andrei Yurov, Youth Human Rights Movement: “In the circumstances of mass civic protests, human rights organizations and civic groups must assume the initiative for monitoring the observance of the whole corpus of human rights, and prevent the emergence of violence on the streets…”

* * *

1. Citizens have the right to monitor the actions of government in their own country. In general terms, this may be almost the only basic right and – at the same time – duty that citizens have in relation to a country and its government. In countries with established democratic traditions this right can be realized peacefully and effectively both during elections (not in the form of political conflict or in the expression of certain political preferences, but in the form of monitoring election procedures, the rules of the game, and the observance of minimal standards and principles of law - and in elementary political decency), and also (what is still more important!) between elections in the form of the most various civic initiatives and institutions, making government at least to some degree transparent and able to take note of the criticism make by citizens. Precisely in order to ensure these functions in any contemporary state protection of such fundamental rights as freedom of assembly and association, freedom of speech and access to information is necessary; and it is precisely these rights that prevent “civil discontent” growing into “civil confrontation” and “civil conflict”. [Read more]

Ella Pamfilova, former chair of the Presidential Human Rights Council, and Valentin Gefter, director of the Institute of Human Rights, were summoned for questioning by the Russian Investigative Committee, Interfax has reported.

Ella Pamfilova herself told Interfax of the fact that she had been questioned, but gave no further details about the interrogation, since she had signed a non-disclosure agreement. However, she noted that she had been surprised by the fact that she was called into the Investigative Committee, as she had nothing to say on the case in question. Pamfilova said she was called in for questioning at the Investigative Committee as former head of the Human Rights Council, and that the investigators wanted to know how the work of the Council was organized. The interrogation took place on Thursday, July 16, Lenta.ru.reported.

According to an Interfax source familiar with the situation, Pamfilova was called into the Investigative Committee to talk about the so-called “experts’ case”, related to the independent review of the conviction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev.

According to Nezavisimaya Gazeta, the director of the Institute of Human Rights, Valentin Gefter was also called in for questioning. He told the newspaper that he was questioned about “whose interests were served by the liberalization of the criminal laws in Russia”. The investigators were interested in the connection between this liberalization and the community of experts, including the Human Rights Council. Gefter noted that, according to the Investigative Committee’s logic, the liberalization of the criminal laws enabled those connected with the Yukos case to either receive a reduced sentence, or to avoid conviction altogether.

According to Valentin Gefter, the investigators were not interested in the analysis of legislation, but in the “criminal connection between the liberalization of laws and those acting on Khodorovsky’s behalf”. No charges have been brought against Gefter, who is a witness in the case. At the current stage, he said, the investigators are “clarifying the circumstances.”

Earlier, former Constitutional Court Judge Tatiana Morshchakova, economist Sergei Guriev, and others involved in the preparation of the independent review of the Yukos case, had been questioned by the Investigative Committee.

Guriev left Russia after the interrogation and resigned as rector at the New Economic School.

Under the so-called “experts’ case”, the Investigative Committee suspects that the independent review of the second Yukos case was financed by Khordovsky and Lebedev. According to the experts’ findings, the conviction of the businessmen should be reconsidered.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-75https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/82763834034367208972013-06-10T12:16:46.209Z2016-07-19T01:01:11.460Z2013-06-10T12:25:38.554ZHuman Rights Council members at Higher School of Economics searched in connection with Yukos inquiry

Searches by law enforcement agencies at the Higher School of Economics, in particular in the faculty headed by the head of the Human Rights Council Mikhail Fedotov, are connected to the independent inquiry into the second Yukos case, spokesperson for the Higher School of Economics Vadim Vorobev told Interfax.

Talking to Polit.ru, Vorobev spoke about criminal investigative measures that had taken place a few months earlier. In fact, as news agencies have reported, the searches took place on 18 April at the UNESCO faculty, the head of which is chair of the Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights, Mikhail Fedotov.

"The investigative actions affected colleagues who are members of the Human Rights Council and who were involved in preparing the independent report on the Yukos case," a source said. Two computers were seized and were later returned. The press service of the Higher School of Economics believes that the actions by investigators would not have negative consequences, either for the university or for its employees.

Previously, as part of the investigation into the independent inquiry into the second sentence handed to Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev, the dean of the New Economic School, Sergei Guriev, was questioned. Guriev, currently in Paris, has said he has no immediate plans to return to Russia, as he fears prosecution.

President Vladimir Putin has said that Guriev has nothing to fear in Russia if he has not broken the law. "Are there actually any grounds for putting him in jail? I know nothing about that. I only recently learned of his name," Putin said.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-54https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/41455561793034082592011-02-21T22:21:25.841Z2016-07-19T01:01:11.207Z2011-02-21T22:23:21.407ZChair of the Constitutional Court Endorses Proposal for Public Reviews of High-Profile Cases

The chair of the Constitutional Court Valery Zorkin has expressed his support for a proposal by the Presidential Council on Civil Society endorsed by Dmitry Medvedev to conduct independent reviews of high-profile legal cases. In response to an open letter from the Presidium of the Council of Judges, Valery Zorkin refused to declare public oversight of high-profile cases a “form of public pressure on the courts”, the Kommersant newspaper reported.

The chair of the Constitutional Court stated that “the independence of judges, a fundamental principle of any democratic state, does not imply that judges should operate in a completely closed way” and that “the authority of judges derives directly from their responsibility, assumes in the first place that judges are accountable to society at large.”

“The public's opportunities to scrutinize and assess verdicts in specific cases, or the judicial practice established with regard to certain categories of cases, cannot be limited in terms of the possibilities of analysis of such cases and their evaluation, including public statements,” Valery Zorkin declared, adding that “this applies particularly to those well-known, high-profile cases that have a bearing on the most important and, at the same time most vulnerable, human rights such as the right to life, personal liberty, and security of person.”

“History teaches us that a lack of feedback between judicial bodies and society often results in situations whereby individuals face the entire might of the state's punitive system while lacking any remedies that would enable them to defend their rights,” the Constitutional Court chair said. He does not think that members of the Council for Civil Society intend to review court decisions that have not yet entered into force, although its members “are entitled to select and scrutinize those cases which they believe have provoked the greatest public reaction, and to draw the President's attention to such cases.”

“This is not to be interpreted as being a new power to review court decisions that violates the principle of equality before the law and the courts,” the chair of the Constitutional Court said. Moreover, he believes that the aims of the proposed oversight might help eliminate instances of unlawful influence on the judiciary by the other branches of State authority, Grani.ru reported, quoting Kommersant.

A few days earlier the Presidium of the Council of Judges had described the idea of a public and independent review of some high-profile criminal cases (such as the YUKOS case and the death of the lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in pre-trial detention) as unconstitutional. The Council of Judges claimed that the proposal violated Article 19 of the Russian Constitution, which guarantees the equality of all citizens before the law and the courts. The judges also pointed out that in a number of cases recommended for review the verdicts had not yet entered into force.

The Council of Judges also asked Valery Zorkin to look into statements made by a retired Constitutional Court judge, Tamara Morshchakova, who had initiated the review of high-profile cases on 1 February. Her proposal was endorsed by President Dmitry Medvedev, who said he “would be grateful” if this task were taken on by experts.

On 30 December 2010 Moscow’s Khamovniki Court sentenced Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev to 14 years' imprisonment in a general regime colony. A press spokesman for the former head of YUKOS believes that following their second sentence the two enterpreneurs might be released in 2017 since their terms of imprisonment have been calculated to include a number of years they spent in pre-trial detention.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky himself claims his second criminal prosecution has been politically motivated and corrupt, and asserts that the trial was initiated by people who want to keep him incarcerated. The former head of the oil giant believes the reason for his criminal prosecution has been his support for independent political opposition in Russia.

The interrogations that the Investigative Committee has been conducting for more than a year in connection with the so-called ‘case of the experts’ are related not so much to the independent report on the ‘second Yukos case’, so much as to the work on liberalizing the Criminal Code, initiated in 2010 by President Medvedev, Gazeta.ru reports, citing statements by experts who have been questioned.

Investigators suspect that the attempt to soften the repressive legislation has been for the purpose of weakening the punishment handed down to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Grani.ru reports.

"Investigators have been interested in the links between this legislative modernization and the independent experts, including those from the Human Rights Council. The logic of the investigators is that the liberalization of the Criminal Code assisted the reduction in sentences or the acquittal of people connected with the Yukos case,” Valentin Gefter, a member of the Human Rights Council who has been questioned, told Grani.ru.

On Thursday Yana Yakovleva, a campaigner for the amnesty for business people and chair of Business Solidarity was called to the Investigative Committee for questioning. She had taken part in parliamentary discussion of the reform of economic criminal law, but the fact that she was summoned for questioning, she said, cannot be linked specifically to the ‘case of the experts’, since she had played no part in that independent review.

"If media publications are carefully analyzed, and if we read what representatives of the Investigative Committee have said about this, and about what the experts said about the questions investigators asked them during the interrogations, then it would seem that in fact the independent review of the ‘second Yukos case’, with all its history, has no special significance," Yakovleva told Gazeta.ru. "In the first place the investigators were interested in the liberalization of the criminal law which began back in 2010, and with the direct participation of then president Medvedev. Proposals were put forward not only by government experts, but also by experts from NGOs. But after all such actions are not criminal."

Withint the framework of the on-going ‘case of experts’ over the past year many well-known human rights activists, lawyers and economists have been summoned for questioning by the Investigative Committee. At the end of July, retired Constitutional Court Judge Tamara Morshchakova gave evidence to investigators. In July, Gefter and ex-head of the Human Rights Council Ella Pamfilova were summoned to the Investigative Committee.

In April last year the official spokesperson of the Investigative Committee Vladimir Markin said that human rights organizations headed by members of the Human Rights Council had been funded by Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

In September last year the homes and offices of some experts were searched, but news of these searches only became known in February 2013. In April there were searches at the Higher School of Economics; in May investigators came to the Centre for Legal and Economic Research.

At the end of May, rector of the New Economic School, Sergei Guriev, emigrated to Paris. He had also been questioned. Anatoly Naumov, who had also been a member of the working group was, according to Morshchakova, forced to resign from the Academy of the General Public Prosecutor’s Office where he worked as head of faculty.

No one has yet been formally charged by the Investigative Committee in relation to its on-going campaign of interrogations and searches of lawyers and human rights defenders who have been linked to the liberalization of the criminal law.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-88https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/54085117209275954172012-05-29T11:19:17.391Z2016-07-19T01:01:10.177Z2012-05-29T11:29:45.737ZYury Schmidt: "I Understood I Was Defending People against a Machine that has No Soul and Knows No Mercy"

On 15 May 2012 at the Moscow offices of the Memorial Human Rights Centre on Karetny Ryad an evening was held in honour of lawyer Yury Markovich Schmidt's 75th birthday. The official part of the event included a conference on the theme: "Being a Lawyer: Profession, Vocation, Duty". The second unofficial part provided speakers and the numerous guests with an opportunity to congratulate Yury Schmidt on his birthday.

Arseny Roginsky, chair of the board of Memorial Human Rights Centre: It is a great honour for me to open this evening. We decided to call our conference "Being a Lawyer: Profession, Vocation, Duty". Each one of these words could be fittingly applied to Yury Markovich. I would like to recall a few facts about him. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyuryschmidt7https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/42989157332487455122013-10-30T20:08:26.436Z2016-07-19T01:01:10.088Z2013-10-30T20:17:35.183ZSolidarity at the Sakharov Center with Khodorkovsky and all political prisoners in Russia

October 25th 2013 marked 10 years since Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former CEO of Yukos, was arrested at Tolmachevo airport in Novosibirsk. To mark this date, international Readings were held in the Andrei Sakharov Museum and Public Center in Moscow as a show of solidarity with Khodorkovsky, Platon Lebedev, and all other political prisoners in Russia.

These Readings are part of a project sponsored by the Berlin International Literature Festival. Public figures, actors, journalists, and other people who are not indifferent came to the exhibition hall of the Sakharov Center where Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s letters to the writers Lyudmila Ulitskaya and Grigory Chkhartishvili, the prisoners of the ‘Bolotnaya case’, and the imprisoned members of the Pussy Riot punk group Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alekhina were read. Some of the last words spoken by the former Yukos CEO in the Khamovnichesky Court and his articles written behind bars and published in The New Times, The New York Times, FT Magazine and other publications were also read.

The texts featured Khodorkovsky’s reflections about the fate of his generation, the question of

responsibility, the emergence of civil society in Russia, and his stories of prison life.

Some of the speakers added a few of their own words while reading Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s texts.

“I thought he would be released after one day, or maybe after two or three days. Then we counted the weeks, and then we started to count the number of months that he was in prison. Now we are counting the number of years. I don’t want to think about how we will start to count the number of decades, although, as you can see, a decade has already passed by. I can’t speak too long about this without crying. I can say only one thing and this is that he is truly one of the best...perhaps the best person of our times,” said Irina Yasina, leader of the Regional Journalism Club, sharing her memories and feelings with other attendees.

Former Yukos employee Vladimir Pereverzin, who spent seven years and two months in prison, also chose to read out part of Khodorkovsky’s last words in court:

“Those people who started this shameful case, Biryukov, Karimov and the others, at that time contemptuously called us ‘businessmen’ and considered us to be trash who were ready to do anything in order to defend our prosperity and avoid prison. Years have gone by and who has proven themselves to be trash now? Who for the sake of money and out of cowardice has lied, tortured and taken hostages in plain view of the authorities? This is what they called ‘a matter for government’! I am ashamed of my government.”

To which Vladimir Pereverzin added “These people, Biryukov and Karimov, received orders ‘For Merit to the Fatherland’—I am ashamed of such a fatherland.”

Writer Lev Rubinshtein, journalists Ekaterina Gordeyeva and Olga Pispanen, and actress Oksana Mysina were among the participants at the readings. Some of the speeches were made via video.

The event in the Sakharov Center lasted for about three hours.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-95https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/79245956139098201142013-02-14T21:21:09.457Z2016-07-19T01:01:09.879Z2013-02-14T21:26:58.289ZMikhail Fedotov on the "case of the experts"

Chair of the Presidential Council on Human Rights Mikhail Fedotov believes that the allegations by law enforcement agencies against the experts who produced an independent assessment of the second Yukos prosecution "don't stand up to scrutiny." [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-33https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/79340659418346328022014-02-01T08:59:29.678Z2016-07-19T01:01:09.833Z2014-02-01T09:02:48.618ZPlaton Lebedev: “I’d like to thank everyone for their sympathy, concern and support”

The press-centre of the former political prisoners in the Yukos case has published a statement by Platon Lebedev. Earlier the Supreme Court of the RF reduced the sentence of former head of Menatep Platon Lebedev to the time he has already served, and ordered his release from the penal colony.

Statement by Platon Lebedev:

“Dear friends,

After nearly 11 years, or more exactly 10 years, 6 months and almost 23 days, I have come home. The main reason why this terrible counting of days has stopped at last lies in your faithful and sincere efforts. I have no doubt about it.

I’d like to thank everyone who, over such a long period of time, sympathized, felt concern, took an interest and supported me.

Thank you for attending those court hearings (physicists know that sometimes the mere observation of a system can change the very nature of the system). Thank you for trying to make sense of the schizophrenic accusations on the Internet, for writing me warm letters to my place of imprisonment, for protesting on the streets and debating at home.

Did we win? We definitely didn’t let them defeat us! However, there’s still much to do together. In fact, it all still lies ahead.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-207https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/34184957653812392772010-11-01T22:03:11.981Z2016-07-19T01:01:09.538Z2010-11-01T22:14:33.279ZYuri Dzhibladze: At Triumphal Square on 31 October

Yuri Dzhibladze, Centre for the Development of Democracy and Human Rights: “I am delighted that the demonstration on 31 October at Triumphal Square was generally very successful, despite all the concerns there had been in relation to the number of people (would they come to an ‘authorized’ rally?), the fears for the behaviour of the police and on account of our opponents / allies in the struggle for freedom of assembly, who had on principle refused to demonstrate jointly with us.

There were between 2,000 and 3,000 people at our rally, and if we take into account those who decided not to get through to the rally, or were unable to do so, because of the crowd and the barriers (there were many like this) there would certainly have been more than 3,000 and probably the number would have reached 4,000.

Katya Gordon sang the political song Mathematics. It seemed no one had forgotten it. At the end of the rally, Oleg Orlov read the resolution of the rally, which everyone supported.

There were no conflicts with the police on the Square (incidentally, this was no pen or small space tucked beside the Hotel Beijing, but a good half of Triumphal Square, a space almost wholly free from fencing that was closed to traffic).

There were no provocateurs from pro-Kremlin movements to be seen.

The one hour, for which the rally had been officially permitted, was clearly insufficient. There were many good faces. People did not want to leave.

We achieved our goals, one could feel the excitement, the desire not to stop but to move on ahead, and it should be said that the division among the protestors was not the main problem or theme. On the contrary, many speakers supported those who stood at a distance from us, "butting heads" with the police, and urged everyone to join forces and not waste energy fighting one another.

In terms of the emotional quality and critical nature of the speeches, the rally was in no ways less impressive than the traditional slogans and placards used at the rallies held in the course of the Strategy-31 campaign. Speeches were loud, clear and very sharp.

In the part of the Square where the activists who did not want to participate in our rally were gathered, the situation was tense and similar to the traditional rallies held on 31st of each month, as far as I could judge from a distance. But the police generally kept a low profile and, judging by media reports, detained only a few people who set off flares and attempted to cut through the notorious fencing. I personally saw only two people dragged away by the police, by the arms and legs, at the very beginning. But I could not see all cases, of course. In the alleyways there were many police and police buses. Where the rally was taking place, there were rather few.

As a joke - how much truth there was in it, I do not know - many were saying that the police allegedly seized Eduard Limonov and dragged him over to where our rally was taking place, and he resisted and did not want to go. If true, this is very funny. If not true, then it's just a very funny joke.

And after the rally, again according to media reports and blogs, one or two hundred activists marched along the Garden Ring road in the direction of the White House, blocking traffic and chanting slogans about Russia without Putin. For a long time they walked without hindrance, but then they caught up with them and twenty or so people were detained."

Friends, Today we have taken an important step forwards. We have won – albeit not entirely - our right to demonstrate peacefully and put forward our demands.

Triumphal Square has become a symbol of the struggle for freedom of assembly. Squares such as this in recent months have become numerous in our country - more than 60 cities have come out on demonstrations with us today. For the first time for many years all kinds of people have begun to regularly take part in demonstrations on many squares throughout the country and together to assert their right to freedom.

Today we demand: Remove this shameful fence from the Square, this symbol of the fear of the authorities before free people. And we will make sure that this fence and the other fences will be taken down, will disappear from the face of Moscow and all Russian cities.

But this is only one step in a long journey. When we have made sure we can freely go out onto the Square, our struggle will not stop. This will give us the opportunity to continue the fight for freedom of assembly. For freedom of assembly always and everywhere. For the right to peaceful demonstrations and marches. For freedom of assembly for all people, representatives of different groups and different beliefs, without discrimination, without beatings or arrests of those taking part, without unlawful prohibitions and restrictions, in all regions, on any topic that concerns people. Freedom cannot be only for an elite. It cannot be divided. It is either the same for everyone, or not at all.

By different routes – campaigns of peaceful civil disobedience, when people lay claim to their rights without prior arrangement, by information, through lawsuits, through negotiating from a position of truth and right, by artistic campaigns. Under the pressure of the citizens, freedom of assembly will be restored in our country.

But this will be just one step on the path to freedom. After all, a rally is not an end in itself. It is an opportunity to loudly and publicly state one’s demands. To say what one cares about. You cannot have freedom only on the 31st day of each month. It should be and will be every day. And you need to fight for it every day, here and now, each person in their own way. Not for nothing the poet said: “Only that person is worthy of life and liberty, / Who each day goes into battle for them.”

The struggle for freedom is a long road. We have many demands, and we announce them loudly, at the top of our voices. Here are just some of them:

- Freedom of assembly always and everywhere! Freedom of assembly for all! - Stop the persecution of civil society and political activists! - Release all political prisoners! Freedom for Sergei Mokhnatkin, Aleksei Sokolov, Zara Murtazalieva, anarchists, environmentalists, activists of The Other Russia, Muslims, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Platon Lebedev, Aleksei Pichugin, Valentin Danilov, Irek Murtazin and other political prisoners! - Investigate all cases of attacks on and assassinations of civil society activists and journalists, ensure the punishment of those guilty! - Repeal the repressive law on combating extremism! Stop the prosecutions for anti-extremism of activists, journalists, artists, museum workers, and Internet bloggers! - Eliminate the shameful lists of “suspected extremists”! - Dissolve the Centres for Combating Extremism! - End torture by police, in pre-trial detention centres and prisons! - Give us a real reform of law enforcement agencies! - Implement real reform and humanization of the prison system! - Repeal the repressive amendments to the law on the FSB! - Restore the independence of the courts! End “Basmanny justice”! - Stop the violence, kidnappings, extrajudicial killings and falsification of criminal cases in the North Caucasus! - Cancel forcible conscription! End arbitrariness, slave labour and humiliation in the armed forces! - Stop discrimination on any and all grounds! - Stop illegal construction to the detriment of residents and without regard for their opinions! - Stop the destruction of nature reserves and protected natural areas! - Stop pressure on the media! Ensure freedom of speech! - Stop the criminal prosecution of journalists and civil society activists on defamation charges! - Ensure freedom of association! Stop pressure on non-governmental organizations! - Restore political competition and the registration of political parties! - Ensure free and fair elections! Punish the perpetrators of fraud! - Dismiss and prosecute corrupt officials and officials who violate the law! - Place government under the supervision of the people!

We declare: “Human rights and freedoms are the SUPREME value in Russia.” This is stated in our Constitution. We declare this today and always. Freedom for all! Always and everywhere!

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyuridzhibladzeattriumphalsquareon31october3https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/48299140280490862882013-06-10T12:18:56.884Z2016-07-19T01:01:09.504Z2013-06-10T12:19:30.928ZMembers of Human Rights Council apologise to experts in Yukos case

”In connection with the situation surrounding Sergei Guriev and other experts brought in by the Council to take part in an independent inquiry into the second Yukos case, we consider it necessary to state the following.

We apologise to all the Russian experts invited by us for the distress and humiliation caused to them by the actions of Russia's law enforcement agencies. Unlike these agencies, we have no doubts either about our good intentions in choosing these experts, nor about their honesty and competence. We would like to stress that the independent inquiry is not a procedural document giving rise to legal consequences, nor is it the conclusive verdict of civil society, but exclusively the result of the serious analytical work of those people who organised it and carried it out. A high-quality result is only possible if experts are given the opportunity to express their independent views without fear. Therein lies the essence of public oversight and agreement between civil society and the government.

Civil society cannot but defend the ideas of public oversight of state institutions, and that means also the independence and free opinions of experts who take part in the work of government and public institutions: without this it is impossible to achieve transparency or government accountability to society. But only guarantees of the independence of such expertise give the moral right to involve the expert community in a professional analysis of issues of public significance and their solution . Otherwise there is no hope of having a responsible or meaningful discussion of them.

Independent experts who contribute to ensuring that the solutions to issues that affect the life of society are of high quality should not be afraid of openly expressing their views. That is why we believe it is necessary to urgently set up a temporary working group into the so-called "experts’ case" and to invite members of the Council who have experience of working in the law enforcement agencies to take part in it.

Concerning Sergei Guriev, we believe his decisions to be the free choice of a decent man who has decided not to compromise his core principles and personal dignity. Any actions by the authorities, however well-intentioned, should not diminish human dignity (Article 21 of the Russian Constitution) or lead to the creation of an atmosphere of fear, mistrust and suspicion in the country. That demeans everyone!

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-62https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/69546642750404074972013-06-01T08:09:48.465Z2016-07-19T01:01:09.485Z2013-06-01T08:10:05.611ZMikhail Fedotov: Experts on the Yukos case acted within the law

Head of the Presiential Council on Human Rights, Mikhail Fedotov, does not believe that Sergei Guriev and other experts who wrote a report on the second Yukos trial and prosecution for the Council violated the law. "I don’t think they are guilty of anything at all. They did their work honestly, professionally, expressed their view, and to suppose that this was some kind of pressure on law enforcement, on the investigation or on the court is nonsense, because this evaluation was published after the court’s sentence had entered into force,” Interfax quotes Fedotov as saying. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infoyukos-42https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/47785972439778767372012-10-03T19:39:29.086Z2016-07-19T01:01:08.298Z2012-10-03T19:44:34.863ZTwo Cases Against Narcotics Expert Olga Zelenina Consolidated Into One

Lenta.ru reports, citing the Interfax news agency, that Penza Agricultural Research Institute employee Olga Zelenina has been given a new version of the charges against her. According to Lenta.ru, the head of the Investigative Department of Russia's Federal Drug Control Service, Sergei Yakovlev, told reporters, "Zelenina has been charged with aiding and abetting the trafficking and preparation of substances for illicit sale as part of an organised group, as well as abuse of office." Previously, the cases of trafficking and abuse of office were being treated separately. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infozelenina5https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/75859225415327404252010-11-30T18:59:42.837Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.251Z2010-11-30T19:01:17.302ZSova Centre on the Official Warning Issued to the Newspaper Vechernyaya Ryazan for an Article about the Police

At the end of November 2010 the Russian Communications Inspectorate announced that it had issued an official warning to the newspaper Vechernyaya Ryazan on the impermissibility of extremist activity regarding publication of ‘On the Alert’ [Byt’ na cheku], an article published on 29 April 2010 in issue No. 16 (1247).

Earlier, with regard to publication of this article, a criminal investigation had already been opened under Article 282 (Section 2, Part ‘b’) of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation (Inciting social hatred, using the mass media and one’s professional situation).

“We consider neither the criminal investigation nor the official warning to be lawful for two reasons: firstly, the article contains no calls to violence; secondly the police, in our view, are not a vulnerable group and have access to enough other legal mechanisms to defend themselves.

Vechernyaya Ryazan is also facing lawful, in our opinion, prosecution for other articles that contain indications of incitement of ethnic and religious hatred”, Sova Centre point out.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infovechernyayaryazan2https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/87653818292931117182012-04-17T21:01:57.112Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.236Z2012-04-17T21:02:16.173ZCourt Refuses to Re-register One of Largest International NGOs in Russia

The Zamoskvorechie district court in Moscow has refused to re-register Russian Justice Initiative, one of the largest foreign NGOs in Russia, thereby confirming the legality of the decision to strike the organisation off the register of legal persons taken by the Russian Ministry of Justice in February 2011.

Following the Ministry of Justice decision, the organisation tried to re-register on three occasions, but all their applications were turned down by the Ministry. The organisation has appealed against every decision through the Russian courts. Lenta.ru, citing the newspaperKommersant, reports that the organization’s appeals are still pending. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infosrji2https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/57794794157619233422011-02-08T22:03:11.833Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.221Z2011-02-08T22:04:41.649ZWinter of Justice: Words and Reality

Mikhail Khodorkovsky: “I have felt it necessary to address the President of Russia personally in connection with the shameful verdict of the Khamovnichesky Court. I know that my move may not meet with understanding among those of my fellow citizens who are convinced that President Dmitry Medvedev does not decide anything, and among those who consider that it is impermissible that he should interfere in the work of the courts. I want to respond to both these groups. The question at issue is not that of interfering with the course of justice, or about my own salvation. The collapse of the justice system that we can see threatens grave consequences for each and all of us, for the whole country.”

The constitutional duty of the President is to ensure the independence of the judiciary, and not just to make declarations to that effect. Therefore, I consider that when facts emerge in the most high-profile case that witness to the lack of independence of the judge, it is not only the right of the head of state, but his duty to order that there be a truly independent investigation. A recent example of an investigation ordered by the president has been that which took place in the ‘Three Whales’ case.

I would like to point out that while my conclusion about the lack of independence of the judge is far from based exclusively on the prime minister’s scandalous speech, I consider it inadvisable, however, to reveal in their entirety all the evidence I have before an investigation has been ordered. At the same time, try to explain in any other way the ridiculous situation when by a ‘court decision’ tens of millions of tonnes more oil were stolen than were produced, when the court’s ruling includes a statement of a ‘lack of trust’ regarding the fact that oil in Siberia is cheaper than in Western Europe, and so on. This is what the defence, the media and even the judge, together with some of the prosecutors, were laughing about during the course of the trial.

The President of Russia is the guarantor of the rights and liberties of citizens. The ever-worsening legal nihilism of judges, and in particular their loose interpretation of criminal law, is a blatant violation of these rights. Where might such a pseudo-judicial practice lead the country, when a court asserts that a transaction that results in the seller receiving a profit in the billions is ‘seizure without compensation’ - theft?!

An enquiry on this point in the name of the President to the Constitutional Court could once and for all put an end to the artificial criminalisation of ordinary business turnover that is widely used by mercenary officials for the purposes of corporate raiding and extortion. My petition to the court on this issue received a stock meaningless response, as have a multitude of other such petitions.

Of course, if a court fails brazenly to implement the law, and the President of the country is not able to change the situation, a constitutional crisis arises. But, fortunately, things have not reached that point yet. The experience of the commercial courts shows that Dmitry Medvedev and his team know how to start changing the situation in the courts for the better.

Much is said nowadays about the informal limitations on the powers of President Dmitry Medvedev. However, I believe it counterproductive to get into a discussion of these views. My country has a President, and his constitutional duty is to protect the rights and freedoms of citizens.

The state of the judicial system is his direct area of responsibility and he has announced it to be one of his priorities.

I am convinced that President Medvedev, as a reasonable and pragmatic politician, is aware of the real attitude of the Russian intelligentsia and of all people who are not indifferent to the evident lawlessness within the agencies of law enforcement and the court system. These people, of course, would never stoop to take part in pogroms, but it is extremely irrational and dangerous for the authorities to deepen the divide between declarations and reality yet further, and thereby show that in practice no other way is left open in the country to defend civil rights than to take to the streets. The ability to rule through the use of crude force without the trust of the people in state institutions is not unlimited.

There is no point in talking about the chances for modernization in the 21st century while ‘administrative methods’ of this kind are in use. It is hard to find a country claiming to be civilised in the 21st century, where at the same time a government official is above the law and the courts, unless we are talking about Russia. The demand for justice, human rights, and the protection of one’s own dignity in our society has reached a point where it is seeks for ways to be realized.

The judicial and law enforcement systems that demonstrate legal nihilism and their sense of impunity are leading both the brazen bureaucracy and its victim – the ordinary person – beyond the pale of the law.

Officials, including judicial officials, have growing appetites and the last remaining incentives for them to honestly carry out their official duties are disappearing. Citizens are compelled either to pay bribes or to find appropriate forms of protest. At the same time, it would be foolish to underestimate the role of the intelligentsia as a catalyst in the process of finding these appropriate forms of protest. When decent people are ashamed for their country, then there arises a sense of ubiquitous lies and of defencelessness before the bureaucrat who knows no bounds and the politician who is nothing more than a corporate raider. When it becomes obscene for a true member of the intelligentsia to serve the government, there is a profound moral conflict and a dangerously festering abscess in society. It is extremely dangerous when government institutions lose their legitimacy in the eyes of a large number of people.

In such a situation, I considered it to be my civic duty to directly address the President with a call to take steps necessary to return the judicial system to the law. I want to emphasize that I do not propose putting pressure on the courts or dictating to them. On the contrary, I propose that the courts be freed from any pressure, public or covert, and from the humiliating role of being a mere appurtenance to the repressive system and an object of manipulation by it. I propose to explain, on the basis of specific examples, that the courts are needed in order to serve justice in the interests of society, not for carrying out orders, even if they come from the very “top”.

So far as the examples of demonstrative legal nihilism are concerned in the monstrous verdict that crowned this landmark trial, they are a direct threat to the entire legal system of the country, at any rate in the realm of economic life. I gave the President just a few examples of the many possible, selecting those I believe to be especially dangerous. This might seem like the ravings of a mad person, but the court’s verdict really does state:

- that the purchase of output by the head company from its 100% consolidated subsidiaries is theft, that is, the seizure of goods without compensation, and by no other than its own shareholder;

- that the receipt by the producer of the output of a profit in the billions confirms the ‘seizure without compensation’ of this same output from these same producers;

- that the ‘correct’ price of oil in the Siberian oil fields is the price in Rotterdam (a port in Western Europe), notwithstanding even customs duties and transport costs.

All of the court’s ‘reasonings’ has been gathered on the website http://www.khodorkovsky.ru/. These include, for example, the following:

‘The decision of the commercial court lacks any assertions that the oil became the property of the Yukos Oil Company … From the decision of the commercial court it follows that the owner of the oil was the Yukos Oil Company …’ I cannot call this anything other than pseudo-legal devilry.

Or: ‘…the guilt of the defendants [for theft of oil] is confirmed by the fact that they took an active part in the creation of the vertically-integrated structure of the Yukos Oil Company’; ‘the defendants… concealed the theft they had committed … through payment of dividends [to shareholders]’; ‘the increase in the volume of oil produced by Yukos [confirms the charge, since]… it corresponded to the mercenary striving to receive ever greater profit.’

That is, while the country’s leaders invite investors and promise them a maximally favourable environment, Russian courts declare that increasing production volumes, profit, and the payment of dividends are evidence of criminal activity.

But, all things considered, Dmitry Medvedev is himself a civil lawyer, with a law degree, and should he so wish he has enough specialists to analyse the hundreds of pages of obvious and demonstrative legal heresy signed by an official in a judge’s mantle who was himself appointed by the President. What is important is something else: what happened at the Khamovnichesky court is not an exception but just the clearest and best known example of the Russian practice of extortion, unlawful redistribution of property and the prosecution of those who are considered undesirable, with the help of a mockery of a justice system. A completely shameless verdict in a high-profile public trial demonstratively lacking in credibility but with an obvious extralegal objective and a shocking 14-year sentence – what is this but an unequivocal signal and invitation to the ‘brotherhood of bureaucrats’ that anything goes?

One should not lull oneself, or the world, into a false sense of security by tales of the exceptional nature of the Yukos case (if it is exceptional, then only in terms of the scale of the disaster), nor of the presidential initiative to ban pre-trial detention in cases of economic crime. Our judicial system, hiding behind incantations about independence and the impermissibility of ‘pressure’, simply disregards any ‘inconvenient’ law. But even if they do not place you in pre-trial detention, the fee for ‘protection’ in the absence of judicial protection will undoubtedly rise in future. And as for human dignity, it is best not to even think about it. Accountability exclusively to the bosses combined with non-compliance with the law is both an indication and a benefit of the tool of extralegal repression. The right not to implement the law is bought at the price of political and bureaucratic submissiveness.

In such conditions it is clear why Russia is attractive to adventurists and embezzlers, but how can serious investors and intellectuals, for whom the whole world is open, be attracted and retained? By a multiple overstatement of the usual profit ratio? By prime ministerial personal guarantees? What kinds of methods of modernisation are these in the 21st century?

So far as I am concerned personally, then, the first ‘tax’ case, about which the President spoke in Davos, and the bankruptcy of Yukos connected with it, has already been recognised more than once by international and foreign courts as ‘discriminatory’, with an ‘unusual’ application of the law. The second case is not only absurd, but is in direct contradiction to the first, and this is already clear to everyone. Given such ‘standards of proof’, the latest sentence has no meaning at all. ‘Grounds’ for the absurd charges, for the purpose of securing an imprisonment without end, are limited only by the fantasy of the officials, and this in turn by the wishes of the bosses.

I know that Viktor Danilkin, the judge of the Khamovnichesky court, is not in the least mad. Furthermore, over the twenty months of the trial I became convinced that he is a very competent professional and a conscientious person. What kind of a choice did they present him with to force him to sign the ‘verdict’? What will his conscience do to him? What do you call people who have done this to someone? What do you call those who pretend they have not noticed what has been going on, who believe in the independence of this ‘court’ and who call the shameless piece of paper an ‘act of justice’? After all, similar things take place in hundreds of trials throughout the country.

Perhaps the time has already come to tell the authorities out loud: ‘Enough promises. Show us here and right now that there is no place for arbitrariness in Russian courts. That a person can achieve justice in them not through bribery, not through extreme forms of protest, but according to the law, as is usual in a normal modern society! That you want to protect, and are able to protect, a person and their business from arbitrariness, and that you do not use arbitrariness in your own interests.’

It was as long ago as the 4th century that St. Augustine said that a state without justice is nothing more than a band of robbers. But in the 21st century Russia deserves better. Would you not agree?

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

The author is a prisoner currently held in the Federal Pre-trial Detention Centre No. 1 of the Federal Penitentiary Service

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infowinterofjustice2https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/62972297459436540132012-10-25T19:31:54.742Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.208Z2012-10-25T19:33:54.393ZLeonid Razvozzhaev: “They Said They Would Kill My Wife and Children”

Zoya Svetova, a journalist and member of the Public Oversight Commission, met with opposition activist Leonid Razvozzhaev, currently detained at the Lefortovo prison. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.inforazvozzhaev-32https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/17676151272546632642012-01-10T11:38:33.498Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.193Z2012-01-10T11:39:56.830ZOrganizing Committee of the “Round Table of 12 December” to Set Conditions for Talks with Putin

The organizing committee of the “Round Table of 12 December” has approved an initiative by former minister of finance Aleksei Kudrin to hold talks between government and the opposition. The statement issued by the organizing committee says that “Kudrin will be informed of the principles and conditions for holding such talks over the next two days”. Members of the organizing committee are ex-prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov, political scientist Georgy Satarov and human rights defender Ludmila Alekseeva.

As Grani.ru reports, on 26 January the first meeting of the Round Table that was set up on Constitution Day (12 December) by a group of academics, cultural figures and civil society leaders, will take place. The stated aim of the forum is to “prevent a political or social explosion in the country and to formulate a systemic alternative to the authoritarian regime led by Vladimir Putin”. A memorandum and appeal by the founders of the Round Table of 12 December was signed by Leonid Parfenov, Boris Akunin, Olga Romanova, Vladimir Sorokin, Ludmila Ulitskaya, Liya Akhedzhakova, Yury Ryzhov, Dmitry Zimin, Yury Norshtein, Sergei Gandlevsky, Dmitry Muratov, Svetlana Sorokina, Andrei Piontkovsky and others. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.inforoundtable-22https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/12567853500082399112013-09-25T07:58:51.105Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.179Z2013-09-25T07:59:27.444ZSign the petition in support of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova!

Convicted member of the Pussy Riot music group Nadezhda Tolokonnikova has declared an indefinite hunger strike in connection with a death threat she received from the deputy head of Colony № 14, Yury Kupriyanov. An urgent collection of signatures for a petition in support of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova has begun. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infopussyriot-562https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/15432161090732197452013-11-04T11:14:30.953Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.164Z2013-11-04T12:48:32.934ZDay of Remembrance for Victims of Political Repression in Moscow

Given that around 30 000 people were shot in Moscow alone in 1937-1938, the commemorative events in the capital will go on for more than just one day.

"A large rally will be held, mainly for the victims’ children and some of the survivors. The names of the victims will be read out at Vagankovsky cemetery during a ceremony which will go on for some hours, and several services will take place there. There will also be a large gathering of former victims at City Hall. Similar events – readings of names, rallies and so on – will take place throughout the country,” said Arseny Roginsky, chair of the International Memorial Society, when discussing the planned events on air at Radio Finam FM.

A memorial board to the writer Varlam Shalamov, crafted by Georgy Frangulyan, will be unveiled today at House No 8 on Chisty Pereulok in Moscow.

The “Voice of Memory” campaign will also be launched today at 10 a.m. at the Butovo firing range, a former NKVD mass murder site, when the names of the people shot there will be read out.

A rally will be held by two NGOs, the Moscow Association of the Victims of Political Repression and Moscow Memorial, at the Solovetsky Stone on Lubyanka Square.

There will also be a special programme of events at the State Museum of GULAG History, with a dedicated concert on Sunday.

On 29 October 2013, the day before the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repressions, a major event, Return of the Names, was organised by Memorial at the Solovetsky Stone on Lubyanka Square in Moscow. One by one, participants read out the names of people shot in the capital during the Great Terror. According to HRO.org, a live video stream of the Return of the Names ceremony was available on the Internet.

The Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repressions has been commemorated in Russia every year since 1991. According to information from the Memorial Human Rights Centre, there are currently around 800 000 people in Russia who have suffered political repression, a figure which includes those who as children lost their parents to repression.

Translated by Joanne Reynolds

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infostalinism-24https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/59694127690205581602012-05-01T13:59:42.559Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.134Z2012-05-01T14:01:23.980ZCouncil of the Federation Ratifies UN Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities

The Council of the Russian Federation has ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, signed by Russia on 24th September 2008 in New York. By ratifying this document, the Russian Federation assumes the obligation of taking all appropriate legislative, administrative and other measures in order to assure the rights of persons with disabilities.

Following ratification, laws which discriminate against persons with disabilities should be repealed. The Rosbalt news agency notes that Russia is now obliged, when working out and applying legislative norms and policy with regard to persons with disabilities, to consult with such persons, including through NGOs that represent their interests. [Read more]

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infounconvention3https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/76499923116441448202010-10-21T08:01:34.536Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.114Z2010-10-21T08:35:25.890ZWill an Executioner's Name Disappear from the Maps of Our Cities?

Acting deputy mayor of Moscow, Valery Vinogradov, has said it cannot be excluded that the streets and the metro station named after Petr Voikov will be renamed. Petr Voikov was a terrorist and leading Soviet figure in the campaigns to expropriate food from the peasantry and nationalize industry, who was also one of the murderers of the family of Nikolai II. The head of Memorial, Arseny Roginsky, has also spoken more than once in favour of the renaming: “Our Moscow administration is overly sensitive. They easily change neutral names. In the case of Voikovskaya metro station, however, they fear taking a political decision. I am convinced that it is necessary to do this.” The public campaign for the renaming of “streets and alleys named after Voikov” is gathering strength not only in Moscow, but also in Ryazan, Voronezh, Samara, Sochi, and other cities.

Petr Voikov took part in the execution of the Tsar’s family. According to one version of the events, it was he who obtained the sulphuric acid used to dissolve the remains of Tsar Nikolai and his family. According to a report by Region.ru/Federation News, Valery Vinogradov, acting deputy mayor of Moscow, noted that there is a special interdepartmental committee within the city administration in charge of the renaming of streets and public places. “Yes, there are problems associated with Voikov. We have received a number of inquiries and the committee has discussed Voikov more than once. However, at present, the committee has not found weighty arguments in favour of renaming. We cannot return the old names to the streets named after Voikov because there were no previous names. But this issue has been considered and could be discussed further in the future,” the acting deputy mayor said. The Romanov family has called on the Moscow authorities not to delay the renaming.

“This would be a just decision. It is imperative to remove the names of well known executioners and murderers, such as Voikov, from the map of Moscow,” said Aleksandr Zakatov, a representative of the Romanov family. He stated that, unlike some Soviet figures after whom streets have been named who could be seen both in a positive and in a negative light, Petr Voikov is “an entirely negative character, a murderer and butcher of children’s corpses.”

A priest of the Russian Orthodox Church, Nikon (Belavenets) also urged that the renaming not be delayed. “For how long will the Moscow city authorities play around with this issue? When they renamed two Moscow metro stations a couple of years ago, no one asked Muscovites’ opinion, and money was found to do it. When it comes to the blood-covered maniac Voikov, the authorities are stalling for some reason,” Father Nikon said. As he stressed, this is a subject “painful for all Orthodox Christians and it is high time to resolve the issue because Voikov was one of the active participants in the murder of Tsar Nikolai’s family. There is a note written by Voikov on the allocation of sulphuric acid for the purpose of destroying the bodies of the Tsar’s family.”

According to the priest, the present-day Moscow city administration “has a chance to distance itself from the bloody drama of our dark past. And it is up to them whether they are going to take this chance or not.” Father Nikon recalled that already in January 1999 a petition had been addressed to the then mayor of Moscow, Yury Luzhkov, with the request to depoliticize the map of Moscow “so that streets’ names would not cause divisions among the people of our city.”

The subject of renaming has re-emerged since then, “but each time they said that the issue would be considered by the city’s interdepartmental committee.”

Incidentally, Valery Vinograd has already stated that there will be no rush with the decision. He pointed out that the law adopted in 1997 regulating the naming of streets and other city sites lays down that existing names can be changed only in exceptional circumstances.

“It is easy to make a quick decision on renaming. One needs time, however, and history will put everything in its place,” said the acting mayor of Moscow.

The history of the renaming of Voikov Alley and the Voikov Streets has been going on a long time. Since 2007 a campaign called Return has been demanding the removal of the murderer’s name from the city map. The organizers wrote to Moscow’s mayor: “It is unacceptable that nearly a thousand Moscow churches hold memorial services for the victims of Soviet repressions, while the metro station continues to carry the name of the child murderer Voikov. Pluralism of this kind in one city resembles social schizophrenia and does not speak well of Moscow.”

The Congress of Russian Americans has spoken out in favour of the renaming. “Living in America, we all closely follow events in Russia. We were very interested in the recent news that thousands of our fellow countrymen in Moscow, Ekaterinburg, and other cities are demanding the renaming of the Voikovskaya Moscow metro station,” wrote Ludmila Foster, Washington representative of the Congress, to Yury Luzhkov. She called Voikov a state criminal.

Mikhail Moskvin-Tarkhanov, the head of the Moscow City Duma’s city development committee supported the idea of renaming. He has said: “Voikov was not only one of the participants in the murder of the Tsar’s family. He personally took the sulphuric acid and poured it on the bodies of the murdered children. He later served as a government agent selling property, confiscated from the Church, abroad. He was one of the most repulsive people of his time and even some of the Bolsheviks would not shake hands with him.”

The head of Memorial, Arseny Roginsky, has also spoken more than once in favour of the renaming: “Our Moscow administration is overly sensitive. They easily change neutral names. In the case of Voikovskaya metro station, however, they fear taking a political decision. I am convinced that it is necessary to do this.”

In 2008, deputy mayor of Moscow Anatoly Petrov, chair of the city interdepartmental committee on the naming of places, streets and metro stations, stated that Voikovskaya metro station will not be renamed. “Members of our committee have considered this problem more than once and we have had professional historians participate in the discussion. Nevertheless, despite the arguments these historians presented, the committee has not been able to support these proposals,” said Petrov. This summer, a variety of civil society organizations have again raised the issue of renaming.

According to HRO.org, the public campaign for the renaming of the streets and alleys named after Voikov is gathering strength not only in Moscow but also in Ryazan, Voronezh, Samara, Sochi, and other cities.

Petr Lazarevich Voikov

Petr Lazarevich Voikov (a Party alias) was born Pinkhus Lazarevich Vainer in 1888 in Kerch, the son of a teacher. His Party nicknames were ‘Petrus’, ‘Intelligent’, and ‘Fair Hair’. He became involved in political activities as a high-school student. When a split occurred in the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party in 1903 between Bolsheviks and Mensheviks, the 15-year-old Voikov joined the Mensheviks. He carried out Party assignments such as distributing revolutionary leaflets and helping to hide Party members who came to the city. According to Wikipedia, Voikov was expelled from the sixth grade of Kerch boys’ high school for underground activities. His family moved to Yalta where his parents, at great effort, enrolled him in the eighth grade of Aleksandrovsky High School for boys (nowadays the Magarach Institute for Grapes and Wine). He was, however, shortly afterwards expelled from there as well. While working in the docks, he passed his high school exams as an external student and received a high school diploma. He then enrolled in the St. Petersburg Mining Institute, from which he was expelled for revolutionary activities.

In the summer of 1906, Voikov became involved in terrorist activities and entered a fighting unit of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party. He took part in transporting bombs and in the assassination attempt on the life of the mayor of Yalta, General I. A. Dumbadze. In the autumn of 1906, in the midst of the revolutionary disorders, a state of emergency was declared inYalta. General Dumbadze ruled the city in an authoritarian way and consequently earned the hatred of liberals and revolutionaries. The latter demanded his immediate resignation and threatened to kill him.

On 26 February 1907 a bomb was thrown at Dumbadze’s carriage from a balcony of Novikov’s dacha not far from Yalta. The mayor was concussed by the explosion but otherwise received only superficial injuries (the explosion blew the peak off his cap); his coachman and horse were wounded. The attacker, who belonged to one of the terrorists’ “mobile strike units” shot himself on the spot. It later turned out that 18-year-old Petr Voikov had been the organizer of the assassination attempt on Dumbadze.

In 1907, Voikov emigrated to Switzerland. He studied at the University of Geneva. There in Geneva he met Lenin, and although Voikov was not a Leninist (he continued to be a Menshevik-Internationalist during the First World War), he spoke out against “Socialist-Chauvinists” together with the Bolsheviks. He also studied chemistry at the University of Paris.

After the February Revolution in 1917, Voikov returned to Russia (but not “in one sealed car with Lenin”, as has sometimes been said), some time later than Lenin in the company of other Russian revolutionaries who were allowed through by the German government. He was the Labour Commissar in the Provisional Government responsible for settling conflicts between factory owners and workers. Voikov, however, always sided with the workers, welcoming worker takeovers of the factories.

In August 1917, he was sent by the Ministry to Ekaterinburg where he served as Inspector for Labour Protection. At first, he did not distinguish himself in any way from other officials in the Urals region. It was in the October days that the citizens of Ekaterinburg found out his true nature. In Ekaterinburg, Voikov joined the Bolsheviks. He became a member of Ekaterinburg Soviet. After the October Revolution, Voikov joined the local Military-Revolutionary Committee that called on all the Soviets of the Urals region “to seize power in the localities and suppress any resistance by force.”

From October 1917, Voikov was appointed a Secretary of the Urals Regional Bureau of Trade Unions and chair of the Ekaterinburg City Duma. In January-December 1918 he was Commissar for Supplies for the Ural Soviet, in which post he was in charge of the food expropriations conducted against the peasantry. In this role, Voikov set prices for food supplies and fuel at a level that made private trade in the Urals impossible. This resulted in shortages of consumer goods and a serious drop in living standards. During the programme of nationalisation of industry that Voikov implemented in the Urals, the former owners of factories were arrested and sent to camps or executed. Brutal measures were taken against peasants who resisted the grain expropriations.

Voikov took part in the execution of the Tsar’s family. He was an active advocate of the murder of all the Tsar’s family. In particular, he signed the official order allocating a large quantity of sulphuric acid for the purpose of completely destroying the bodies of those murdered.

In March 1919, Voikov became deputy chair of the board of the newly created Central Union of Consumer Cooperatives. In October 1920, while still deputy chair of the board of the Central Union of Consumer Cooperatives, he became a member of the board of the People’s Commissariat of External Trade. In 1921, he was appointed deputy chair of North Forest, a mixed state-and-private trust (after the end of the New Economic Policy in 1929, the trust was merged into the Supreme Economic Council). Voikov was one of the organizers of the sale abroad by the Soviet government of the treasures of the Imperial Family, the Kremlin Armory and the Diamond Reserves.

In 1921, Voikov headed the Soviet negotiating delegation to discuss with Poland the implementation of the Riga peace accord. In his attempt to establish diplomatic relations at any price, Voikov presented the Poles with Russian archives, libraries, art objects, and other valuables. In August 1922, he was appointed diplomatic representative of the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic to Canada. However, because of his involvement in the murder of the Tsar’s family, he did not receive the approval of the Canadian government.

In October 1924 Voikov was appointed Soviet Plenipotentiary Representative to Poland. On June 7, 1927, Voikov was shot dead by B. S. Koverda, a Russian emigré, at Warsaw railway station. In response to his assassination, on the night of 9-10 June 1927 the Bolshevik government summarily executed 20 representatives of the aristocracy of the former Russian Empire who at that time were either in prison on various charges or had been arrested after Voikov’s assassination. Voikov was given a solemn burial at the Kremlin Wall in Moscow. A Moscow metro station, a Moscow chemical plant and five streets were all named after Voikov. This was done not only in Moscow. To this day in a whole series of Russian cities there are streets, alleys and thoroughfares that bear the name of Voikov.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infovoikov3https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/58067047595739550022011-03-10T21:35:12.399Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.099Z2011-03-11T09:41:57.718ZSorcery of Numbers

Natalia Taubina, Public Verdict Foundation: From school days I have loved mathematics. My degree diploma reads: ‘Specialism: Applied Mathematics’. I have a great respect for figures and when I see that there are some problems with accuracy or logic, it annoys me. On 1 March the new law on the police came into force, and also seven presidential decrees were signed and published setting out the new structure of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the functions of the police and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the number of employees and the procedures for their re-evaluation. News agencies have reported that by 1 January 2012 'the maximum number of staff of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies will be 1,106,472, which is 170,000 less than now.'

Let us examine the text of the decree on the size of the workforce more carefully. The first point states that what is in question is the maximum number of staff of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies that are funded by the federal budget. In this same point there is a reservation that the maximum number of staff does not include personnel engaged in protection and servicing of buildings. Further on, the third point of the decree abolishes from 1 January 2012 the regulations in force today. In accordance with decrees No. 1246 of 31.10.2005 and No. 41 of 11.01.2008, the maximum number of employees of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies (excluding personnel protecting and servicing buildings) funded at the expense of the federal budget was 821,172.

A number of questions arise.

The decree treats separately the number of personnel funded from the federal budget. In other words, from 1 January 2012 there will continue to exist Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement personnel who are funded from regional and local budgets. And what will be their numbers? By how much will these numbers change in comparison with current numbers?

Presidential decree No. 1468 of 24.12.2009 that set in motion the reform of the Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies laid down that the government should prepare proposals to allow the funding of the public order police from 1 January 2012 exclusively through the federal budget. What proposals have been prepared? What will change from 1 January 2012 in the structure of the funding of the personnel of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies? How will the balance change between those financed from federal, regional and local budgets?

Today the maximum number of personnel of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies funded from the federal budget is 821,172. From 1 January 2012 this number will be 1,106,472. And this is at the same time as there is a reduction of 170,000 employees?

I would like the authorities to give clear and accurate answers to all these questions. And until we have these answers, I have absolutely no faith in the reform of Ministry of Internal Affairs law enforcement agencies.

Until the authorities recognize (in deed and not just in words) that society has the right to know about the structures and operating procedures of State institutions, and also provide society with appropriate and accurate information, we shall as before only be able to guess as to why, for example, the transition from 800,000 personnel to more than a million can be presented as a reduction.

This kind of confusion over the figures, the sketchy and uncoordinated manner in which information is made public, the manner in which decisions are communicated when they have already been made, and without considering it necessary to inform the public accurately, fully or in a timely manner about the plans for change, still more to allow the public to participate in the discussion and development of any innovations, all this only serves to reduce public trust in State institutions in general, and in the law enforcement agencies in particular. And after all, one of the main tasks of the reforms begun at the end of 2009 was precisely that, to win the trust of the public.

Rights in Russiarightsinrussia@rightsinrussia.infosorcery7https://sites.google.com/feeds/content/rightsinrussia.info/hro/6361116229443993722011-05-17T21:36:49.928Z2016-07-19T01:00:56.079Z2011-05-17T21:37:45.076ZBoris Altshuler: Lessons of Sakharov. On the 90th Anniversary of His Birth

On 21 May it will be 90 years since the birth of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (21.05.1921 - 14.12.1989), one of the most outstanding figures of the twentieth century: a theoretical physicist and designer, who became an academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR at the age of 32, the ‘father’ of the Soviet hydrogen bomb, and laureate of the Nobel Peace Prize (1975).

But Russia has never learned her lessons,

Nor has she ever healed her wounds,

And they become inflamed, and bleed,

And resentment gnaws, and guilt like a bone sticks in the throat.

The new century has for Russia not been an epoch, nor even anything new.

To celebrate the Andrei Sakharov anniversary in Moscow a series of events has been organized to discuss the legacy of Sakharov’s scientific work and his civic activism.

Sakharov’s scientific legacy continues to lead an interesting life. It is enough to do an Internet search for ‘Sakharov oscillations’ to be convinced of this. Here the issue concerns the so-called acoustic fluctuations of background radiation discovered experimentally in 2001. According to Sakharov’s calculations of 1965, these are the imprint of quantum fluctuations of the vacuum in the first moments of the existence of the Universe.

Things are worse with Sakharov’s civic legacy. His main ‘lesson’ is that any ideologies and ‘great ideas’, for which living people are sacrificed, are dangerous. But it was just such a sacrifice that happened in the 1990s, the years of ‘market’ reforms. And today ‘market schizophrenia’, the commercialization of spheres of life of vital importance for people, is killing the country. This is why in 1998 we had 22 million children of school age, and now there are 12,8 million. "Coughing blood " (see the epigraph), Russian science is gradually dying, and much else besides. There are well-known methods to resolve in essence all the problems that face the country today, but it is also well-known that the state machine is not Baron Munchhausen who pulled himself by the hair out of the quagmire. Throughout the world, problems are resolved only thanks to the ‘external’ influence of civil society.

A.D.Sakharov in his work gave an example of the powerful influence that civil society can have on the authorities. Today, this ‘lesson’ of Sakharov begins spontaneously to become part of our life. There are two reasons for this: (1) the post-Soviet "uncowed" generation, not burdened by the Soviet complex of passively waiting for decisions to be made by higher-up comrades, have entered into conscious adult life, and (2) the development of social networks on the Internet, what is called Internet-democracy.

This is what Sakharov said about young people in an interview in the spring of 1989: "I believe that moral strengths have always been preserved among the people. I especially believe that young people, who in each generation begin to live as it were afresh, are able to take a high moral position. We are talking not so much about rebirth, as about the fact that there must be a development of the moral strength that is present in each generation, and capable of growing stronger again and again."

And all our hope lies in this.

Boris Altshuler

Senior Researcher, Department of Theoretical Physics, Physics Institute of the Academy of Sciences,

Director, Right of the Child,

Member of the Moscow Helsinki Group,

Member of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation

The following events will be held to celebrate the 90th anniversary of Andrei Sakharov’s birth (Moscow):

25 May, 11.00 - 17.00. Scientific Session of the Department of Physical Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Physics Institute of the Academy of Sciences, Leninsky Prospect, 53). Entrance is free of charge; to enter the Physics Institute of the Academy of Sciences on 23, 25 May it is necessary to present some ID.)